What is Piaget Theory And What Are The Different Stages Of Piaget Theory

Read on to know in detail about Piaget theory and different stages of Piaget theory to make it easy for you to crack CTET and TET exams.

Piaget theory is an important concept for CTET and TET exams, candidates who are aspiring to become teachers. Piaget’s theory is a concept from Child Development and Pedagogy and you can master it in just a few minutes.

In this post, we will discuss Piaget theory and different stages of Piaget theory to make it easy for you to answer the questions that are asked in CTET and TET exams.

What is Piaget Theory?

A Piaget theory is a comprehensive theory about the nature of child’s development. This theory was first created by the Swiss Development psychologist, “Jean Piaget .” The Piaget Theory deals with the nature of knowledge itself and how humans gradually come to acquire, construct, and use knowledge.

Important Words from Piaget Theory –

Schema – A mental framework or pockets of information through which categories of information are organized.

Assimilation: The process through which we take in new information or experiences and fit them into our existing ideas.

Cognitive Equilibrium: A state of balance between an individual’s mental schema and the external environment.

Accommodation: The process which new information or experiences cause the brain to modify existing schema.

Different Stages of Piaget Theory

There are 4 stages in a Piaget theory –

Sensorimotor (0 – 2 years) – First stage of Piaget Theory

The sensorimotor stage starts from the day a child is born and continues till the child reaches the age 2. A child uses his senses (all the 6 senses). After 8 months a child gets the knowledge of object permanence.

Meanings:

Object Permanence – It is the understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be observed.

2. Pre-operational (2 – 7 years) – Second stage of Piaget Theory

This is the second stage. This stage occurs between 2 – 7years. In this stage, the child represents knowledge through language, signal and images.

The three aspects that occur at this stage are –

Egocentrism – the stage in which a child cannot think from others’ viewpoint.

Animism – A term which describes the phenomenon that children think toys are real and similar to humans.

Centration – The tendency to focus on only one aspect of a situation and neglect other, possibly relevant aspects.

3. Concrete Operational (7 – 12 years) – Third stage of Piaget Theory

This is the third stage of Piaget theory. At this stage, a child who is between the age group of 7-12 years learns conservation, reversibility, decentration, and a child starts to reason logically about objects and events.

Meanings:

Concrete Operational – Children can reason logically about concrete objects and events.

Conservation – The ability of a child to understand that changing the form of a substance or object does not change its amount, overall volume, or mass.

Reversibility – The process that develops the ability to recognize that quantity or shape of an object can be altered and returned to their original condition.

Decentration – The ability to consider multiple aspects of a situation.